


One Hundred Yesterdays (Part 2)

by QuietDarkness



Series: Simplicity and Complexity (Harrisco) [20]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M, harrisco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-05-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 17:22:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10995471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuietDarkness/pseuds/QuietDarkness
Summary: Cisco has refused to stop believing that Harry is still alive, even after months of Wells being stranded on a barren and uninhabited Earth with a dangerous meta and god knows what else. He hasn't lost faith that they would find some way to get Harry back. Then a confusing encounter with a strange entity may offer a literal piece to the puzzle that Cisco's been missing from the start. And 'hope' might be far more tangible than anyone thought...'Opposites don't just attract. They catch fire and burn the entire city down.'(Part 20)





	One Hundred Yesterdays (Part 2)

_'I didn't fall in love you with you. I walked into love with you, with eyes wide open, choosing to take every step along the way. I do believe in fate and destiny. But also believe that we are fated to do the things that we'd choose anyway. And I'd choose you... in a hundred lifetimes, in a hundred worlds, in any version of reality. I'd find you, and I'd choose you.' -Kiersten White_

* * *

He could still smell Harry's cologne. 

When Cisco had opened the cabinet in the bathroom, the smell of it had wafted out, filled his nose, his lungs. The airy scent of Old Spice was both comforting and heart wrenching, and Cisco had stood in front of that open cabinet for nearly fifteen minutes, unable to close it and not daring to reach in. Now that he was at S.T.A.R. Labs, he swore he could still smell it. Like it had burrowed into his senses, and every time he took a breath it was there to remind him of things both wonderful and painful. Things like how the cologne took on a very signature smell when settled into Harry's skin. Things like how Cisco loved to bury his face into Harry's chest just to take a deep breath of it. And then Harry would wrap his long arms around him, warm and safe and strong.

"Shit..." he whispered, the threat of tears in his eyes making his jaw clench. He pushed up from the chair he'd been sitting on for nearly three hours now. The table before him was a literal puzzle of all the pieces of his goggles and Reverb's. He'd decided to completely take them apart, start from scratch, figure out exactly what was missing and why he couldn't make them work. He'd labeled everything, made an inventory of parts. And now he just needed to test individual pieces, to figure out if it anything wasn't working as it should before putting it back in the whole. But first... more coffee.

Not that he really needed more. He was practically living off the stuff. Hot and black and pumped full of caffeine. It was even substituting meals now, mostly because he either forgot to eat or just didn't have the energy to do much more than munch on random junk food. Much to Caitlin's chagrin, that is. _'You need to take care of yourself, Cisco. You won't do anyone any good if you're passed out from hunger.'_ He knew she was right. She always was. But wasting time on eating was wasting time he could use to fix the goggles and get Harry home. 

The sad part was, the people around him were beginning to lose faith. He'd heard Barry and Caitlin talking about the odds, that Harry was probably dead by now. Yeah, Cisco knew they had every reason to believe that. But he couldn't. His heart wouldn't survive it. And neither would Jesse's. That was why he wouldn't even think on it. And there was also this nagging sense in the back of his head that kept telling him that Harry was still alive, that he was far too stubborn to die. After everything that man had been through, suffered and survived, there was no way he was going to die now. He just... he couldn't. For about the millionth time in a little over three months, Cisco's eyes burned with the threat of tears as he made his way to the kitchen they all used. Tears he was more and more refusing to shed. He needed to be strong, for Jesse. And to be able to find Harry. If he faltered, if he wavered in his resolve, then he would fail Harry. And that was just not an option. 

There was something about loving someone this much that was painful. Being with Harry was a roller coaster ride. The man could be the most tender, most gentle and loving person on the planet. And he could also be the most hard, most dangerous and serious man in existence. Still... he was everything Cisco wanted. When Harry looked at him, Cisco could feel the Earth move. The man had quaked a stillness in him that Cisco hadn't even known existed. He'd taken all of Ramon's broken parts and fit them back together, piece by piece, proving to Cisco that he was so much more than experience had taught him. And not once had Harry ever given up on him. 

Sure, Harry had given up on himself many times. But never on Cisco. 

And that... well, that was all Cisco had ever wanted from anyone. There were days before he'd met Harry that Cisco was pretty sure he was just not the kind of guy anyone wanted a forever with. He could make friends at the drop of a dime, but holding down a relationship, finding someone who was willing to take Cisco as he was? That was like seeing a unicorn, which everyone knew didn't exist. 

And then a cantankerous, hard headed, pain in the ass, frustrating man came into his life and proved to him unicorns were actually real. Harry was Cisco's unicorn. Though he'd probably torture him if he ever said that out loud. Because that was Harry. He was the guy who would never believe any of the good things people said about him. He would never see himself in the same light that Cisco did. Because he was blind to it. Sure, Cisco saw the darkness, too. But that was because Harry didn't try to deny it was there, he didn't lie about it or try to hide it. Instead, he used it as a tool to force himself to be better, to be the good man that everyone else knew he was. Harry was always trying to better. _'You and Jesse... you're my reasons. For everything.'_ Harry had told him once. Knowing that Harry loved them that much was sobering, and heart warming. And sometimes a little overwhelming.

Sometimes, Cisco wondered how a man like Harry could love him so much. In so many ways, they were extreme opposites. But then Harry would smile when Cisco lost his temper, or talk him back to calm when the world made him feel like crying, or find a way to remind him that Cisco was so much stronger than he felt half the time. Harry always said Cisco brought the best out of him. Well, Harry did that for Cisco, too. 

A thought that made him smile as he headed down the hall with a piping hot cup of coffee, back to the lab and the problem of a pair of vibing goggles that just wouldn't fricken work. But when he got back to the Cortex, he simply stopped next to the console desk where their monitors and computers were spread out.

"What the..." he whispered, then looked around without moving his head as though he were afraid if he budged too much, his brains might fall out. But the image before him didn't change. "I'm tripping." He muttered. Hallucinating. Had to be. _Yup. Way to go, Cisco,_ he thought. _That's what thinking about unicorns gets you._ It was the only explanation for what he was seeing, really. 

He knew the face before him because he'd seen it in pictures Jesse had shown him. He'd seen it in an aged photo in Harry's wallet. 

He knew that face because he had told himself to remember it with kindness and respect. 

Tess had been such an integral part of Harry and Jesse's lives, how could he not? And yet now he was starting to regret it. 

"I really need to cut back on the coffee..." He mumbled from where he was standing, looking down into the latest refill of his mug. Slowly, he reached over and set the coffee on the console beside him like it might explode. Then he cringed when he pulled his hand away. "And sleep." He added, seeing she was still there, standing near Barry's suit, smiling brightly. Cisco narrowed his eyes and very slowly moved toward her, hands empty at his sides. The closer he got, though, the more real she seemed. Which was both fascinating and really fucking terrifying. He stopped about eight feet away, just staring at her. Then he squeezed his eyes shut, rubbed them, dropped his hands, counted ten out loud, and opened them.

'I'm real, Cisco.' She said, making Ramon nearly jump out of his skin, a hand clasping to his chest as he took two very quick steps backward, heart pounding and eyes going wide. 

"Hoooly Hannah...." he blurted, then slowly lowered his hand, clearing his throat, unable to erase the grimace on his face. "Are you a ghost?!" He demanded, his voice slightly squeaky. "Because if you are, I soooo can't be haunted right now!" He took a couple more steps back, but she just stayed where she was, looking pleasantly calm in a way that reminded him a little bit of Jesse when she dealt with her Dad. 

'Very far from it. Nor am I a hallucination.' She gently clasped her hands in front of her. 'So I do not repeat the same mistake, I should inform you that I am not Tess. I have merely... assumed her form for the time being.' Cisco froze, watching, listening. But then his eyes narrowed. This was nuts. Like, three-fries-short-of-a-Happy-Meal nuts. He blinked a few times. Nope, she was still standing there. Huh.

For a very long moment, she stared at him and he stared at her and he let out a deep breath. There was one way he could immediately think of to test the theory that he was either in fact losing his mind or being haunted. He reached into his pocket, then, pulling out a pen. And without so much as a word, he flicked it at her. The pen went through Not-Tess and hit the wall on the other side.

"HA!" Cisco found himself grinning, waving a hand at her, "If you're not a ghost and not a hallucination, explain that!" He put his hands on his hips feeling oddly triumphant. "Unless the explanation is that I _am_ actually going insane which would make a lot of sense considering how little sleep I've had lately but I really can't deal with that right now." His smile wavered as he rambled, but she grinned back at him, turning slightly to look at the pen that had rolled near her bare feet. 

'I can see why you and Harrison work so well together. He had much the same reaction as you just now.' She said, looking back over at him. 'I have seen all his memories of you. They are quite accurate.' 

"Memories of..." Suddenly Cisco felt stunned, as though he'd been shocked into submission by her saying Harry's name. "You... have you seen Harry?" He whispered harshly, a tug in his throat, a pain in his chest that was all too real for this to be some sort of sleep-deprivation induced dream. When she nodded, he felt his limbs turn into rubber and he had to turn, hands finding the table with his disassembled goggles. He took in a deep breath, feeling slightly dizzy. "What is happening?" He said loud enough to make sure he could hear it over his own ragged heartbeat. 

'He's alive, Cisco.' Not-Tess said, but not from behind him. She was suddenly in front of him, at the opposite side of the table. Instinct told him to step back, to run, to do anything but stand there like a deer in headlights. But all he could do was stare at her, tears welling up in his eyes, rolling down his cheeks as his lips quivered and he gripped the table for dear life. 'You know it's true. You've felt him.' Her voice was so sweet, so soothing. 'You have a unique gift... your vibing. You can see many things. But you can feel things, too.' She tilted her head a little. 'You didn't know that, did you?' She smiled warmly at him, reminding him so very much of Jesse that it was eerie. 'When someone with your abilities is connected to another in such a deep and permanent way, you can feel when they are hurt or dying... or if they are very much alive. I think that's why you haven't given up faith, when everyone else has begun to lose it.'

Cisco swallowed, slowly letting go of the table and straightening up. "What... who are you? How do you know so much about me? About vibing? How could you have seen Harry?" Once he started, the questions began to come out like word vomit. He just couldn't stop. "He's on another Earth, have you been there?!" His voice was getting louder without him really realizing it. And before he could ask anything else, Not-Tess put up her hand. He wasn't sure why, but that simple motion shut him right up.

'For all intents and purposes, you can simply consider me an interested observer. A... Watcher, if you will.' She let her hand fall, slowly walking around the table, her eyes lingering on the meticulously laid out pieces. 'I know so much about you, about what you can do, from reading Harrison Wells' mind. He is the first of your kind I have ever seen.' She looked back at Cisco as she rounded the corner, 'Human kind, that is.' She stopped just before him, facing him with such a delicate and calm expression that it eased something inside of him. 'And from the people on this Earth, I have learned a great deal more.'

"Wait..." he found his voice again, but it was soft, tentative, and he cleared his throat. "You're some kind of... alien?" Yeah, that sounded a lot less dumb in his head. She just chuckled, a pleasant sound, before shaking her head.

'No. Far from it. More like... an intelligent essence.' She replied. Cisco just blinked.

"Right... I have no idea what that means." He stated lightly. "Are you sure I'm not dreaming or something?" He asked incredulously. He just couldn't help it. As real as this all felt and seemed, it was just too fantastic to be credible. Even for him. 

'We could spend more time debating the validity of my existence and your sanity, or I could give you what you've been missing, Cisco.' She said, still smiling lightly, as though nothing upset her, not even a little. 

"W-what have I been missing?" He found himself asking, and at the same time fearing the answer. And for the second time in just a matter of minutes, Cisco nearly jumped out of his skin again. His hand was suddenly going up, against his will, palm out, fingers splayed. "What the hell?!" He blurted, eyes going wide. But then she raised a finger at him. Just one, moving it slowly toward his head. He should have backed the heck up, should have ran, yelled for Barry. Anything but stand there. And yet...

'You haven't given up on Harrison. And he still holds on tightly to you and everyone else here. For the gift of knowledge that he has granted me, I have chosen to help him. And you.' The finger came closer to Cisco's head, and she smiled so brilliantly, so beautifully that Cisco's mind went completely blank. 'What you've been missing is something that found its way through the breach with Harrison when he was first thrown into my Earth...' And then she touched his head. '...a little piece of Hope.'

And everything went momentarily black. 

When Cisco's vision returned, she was gone. As though Not-Tess had never even been there. And he felt... shit, he felt good. Refreshed, even. Like he'd slept in, gone on vacation at the beach, and ate a feast in a matter of minutes. "Again... what the hell?" He mumbled, taking a slow step backward to make sure his legs still worked. That was when he noticed his hand was still outstretched, but it was closed tightly in a fist. Inch by inch, he uncurled his fingers. And what escaped his mouth when he saw what was resting in his palm was somewhere between a sob and a cry of joy.

Quickly, he turned toward the table where his puzzle-pieced goggles lay waiting to be put back together. And slowly, almost shakily, he set down what was in his hand. 

A small, but very completely far too damn important, piece of the wavelength trigger that no one would have known was missing due to the fact it should have been encased inside the frequency modulator. "A little piece of Hope." He let out a deep breath, grinning like an idiot before burying his face in his hands. He took some deep breaths, in and out, settling his nerves and everything else before dropping his hands and looking around the empty Cortex. Who or whatever Not-Tess was... she'd just changed everything. "We're coming for you, Harry." Cisco whispered, then sat down and got to work as fast as he could.

* * *

_'Hell is something you carry around with you, not somewhere you go.' -Neil Gaiman_

* * *

_Harry smelled wet earth._

_The ground beneath him was cold and damp, a near perfect re-enacting of the moment he'd woken up in this Earth. But that could be lumped up to the fact this whole place was wet and stuck between Autumn and Winter. What was really strange was what he saw when he opened his eyes. Trees, but not just any. Though they looked exactly like every other tree he'd ever seen here, he knew they were different. He'd marked them, months ago. They were the trees in the exact spot he'd first come-to nearly one-hundred days ago. He'd carved X's in all of them, and in trees leading to them, so he wouldn't forget them. He went back and checked them all the time, to see if the others had finally come. But he was pretty damn sure he hadn't made his way back to them yet. At least, not on his own. Slowly, he pushed himself up to a sitting position, then scooted his back against a tree. It was then that he realized he felt different. Less tired, less hungry, just... better. Which didn't make any sense at all._

_Shit, nothing that was happening made any sense. Seeing Tess... no, not Tess. Hope, she called herself. Had she brought him here? 'They're coming for you, Harrison.' She'd said. Did she mean..._

'Yes.' _He heard her voice and stiffened, looking to the side to see her standing there, perfect and smiling._ 'That is exactly what I meant.' _She added, lowering herself to the ground to sit, legs crossed beneath the skirt of her still very white summer dress. He didn't say anything, just let himself relax, but he kept staring at her. His pulse rifle was on the ground near him. But his bone knife was gone._ 'You won't need it. Nothing will harm you while I'm here.'

"Stop doing that." _He growled out._ "Stay out of my head." _He practically ordered, looking away and reaching for his pulse rifle. He dragged it through the ground debris to his lap. But he just set it there. No point in shooting her. She'd already proven things went completely through her._

'My apologies.' _She said with a soft smile, as though his gruffness was more an amusement than anything else._ 'I find your mind pleasant. Far more pleasant than the other one. You call him Zero Point?' _She shook her head a little, her eyes looking stern for a moment,_ 'His mind is full of dark, terrible things.' _Harry looked back at her, one brow raised._

"And mine isn't?" _He asked skeptically. She met his gaze with a soft shrug and that ever present smile._

'There is darkness. But you actively fight against it. You choose to be good. I've come to learn this is an aspect of your kind. You have both light and dark within you. It's what you choose to nourish that defines you, though in Zero Point's case there is very little light to be had.' _Well, that was a hell of an answer. Harry just stared at her like she had seven heads. She might as well have._

"My kind." _He shook his head a little._ "You said... you'd never come across my species before, correct?" _She nodded, folding her hands in her skirt._ "Then how can you speak my language so easily?" _Ever the curious scientist, it seemed. Even in the middle of hell, he couldn't shut that part of himself off. And it seemed to make her happy, because she grinned at him._

'You taught me. Your memories, your mind.' _She answered. Apparently, whatever she was made her a very quick learner._

"What are you? And don't tell me Hope." _He gritted out, one hand lifting to run through his hair idly before momentarily dragging his palm down his face, and over the stubble on his chin and cheeks. He didn't have a beard only because he'd learned to use the bone knife he'd made to shave with. He wasn't even sure why he'd bothered. Maybe he'd just been trying to hold on to some sense of normalcy._

'You don't have a word for my kind. I told Cisco that I am an intelligent essence, and that seems to be an accurate definition.' _She stated, and his eyes moved to her quickly, hand falling._

"Cisco... you... you spoke to Cisco?!" _He demanded, quickly getting to his feet, pulse rifle held heavily in one hand._ "How?! When?!" _He demanded, marching over to her. His heart was suddenly racing in his chest. But he stopped himself a few feet from her. She just looked up at him like he wasn't some tall, easily angered and strong man holding a dangerous weapon and looming over her._

'While you were resting.' _She said, gracefully standing, meeting his gaze with a spark of humor in her eyes._ 'I transversed to your Earth, to give him something he needed, so that you can go home. I told you, Harrison. I want to help you.'

"Transversed. I don't understand..." _His mind was reeling, and he felt like he was having too hard a time catching up beyond the fact that she'd spoken to Cisco. His Cisco._

'This Earth is connected to all other Earths in what you call the multiverse. You came here through a breach. But there are many roads to the same destination. Many ways to go from Earth to Earth. I can transverse from one to the next at will, take a... different road than breaching.' _She attempted to explain. But shrugged when he furrowed his brows at her._ 'A frog can hop from one pad to the next in a pond, then back again as easily as,' _she snapped her fingers,_ 'The twitching of its muscles. It uses its own strength, its own energy to do so. I simply do the same.'

"Simply." _He reiterated, then made an exasperated sound._ "Nothing about that sounds simple." _He grated, but then motioned to her._ "You said you spoke to Cisco. Is he... is he alright?" _He asked, his voice growing a touch softer. And she smiled. Smiled like the moon and sun were in view at the same time. She was always goddamn smiling._

'He is now. He has never lost sight of you. He has felt you throughout your time here.' _Her words should have been comforting, but they weren't. Yes, he was glad Cisco was okay. But at the same time... where the hell was he, then? Why hadn't he come for him? Months... literal months... and no Cisco, no Barry, no one. Just him barely surviving and wondering if they'd abandoned him or forgotten him. Which never made sense, but the more time went by, the more it ate at him. Her face sobered before him, then, and she stepped forward, till she was directly in front of him._ 'Please do not be mad. I understand the anger, the pain you feel. But Cisco and the others have been trying very hard to get to you. You see, his goggles? They were destroyed when Zero Point dragged you through the breach. And a very important piece of them came through as well. It was not till recently that I realized this. Cisco has exhausted himself trying to repair the goggles. I brought the piece to him so that he can fix them, and bring you home.'

"If you can... hop from Earth to Earth, why not just take me with you, back to mine?" _He asked, searching her face. For all that she looked and sounded like the Tess he remembered, it was very clear to him that she wasn't. Still, it was hard not to stare at her._

'I can hop. Not you. As I said, I am an essence. I do not have a physical form. You do. And you would not survive the transversing.' _She explained, and he sighed, closing his eyes and shaking his head before turning away from her. Nothing she was saying made much sense to him. But he unfortunately had no choice but to take her word for it. He opened his eyes, his back to her, looking up at one of the trees he'd marked._ 'You're going home, Harrison. Truly, you are. I wish you to know that I feel great sorrow for the pain you have suffered here.' _He turned at the sound of the sadness in her voice, feeling his throat tighten at the sudden play of emotion on her features._ 'There are many things my kind do not know. But we can feel, as great or even greater than most species. And I have felt your pain as though it is my own. It is why I want so badly for you to go home. To your Earth.' 

_Suddenly, her eyes darted to the side and her whole image paused, as though someone had pressed a button and froze her in time for a breath of a moment. Then she looked back at him, her eyes and smile somewhat sad._ "What's wrong?" _he found himself asking, tightening his grip on his pulse rifle slightly._

'They will be here shortly, and I'll make sure their powers are stable to get you all back.' _She responded,_ 'But before they arrive, Harrison... I wish you to know, all the awful things you think of yourself... as deserving as you think you are of them, you aren't. You see,' _she moved toward him, reaching out and touching his face. And like before, he couldn't feel her. But he didn't move away, either._ 'You've made mistakes, you've struggled, you regret so much. But you are not your mistakes, Harrison Wells. Sometimes, good people make bad choices. This doesn't make you bad. It makes you... human.' _She let her hand fall, still smiling so warm and real that it made his heart ache. He felt a tear escape his eye before he even knew it had formed._ 'You taught me this. Now it's time to learn your own lesson, don't you think?' _She asked, stepping back and motioning behind him. He blinked at her, then turned to look at what she was eluding to._

_Behind him, a swirling bright white and blue mass of light suddenly erupted._

_A breach._

_And he felt himself let out a sound that was halfway between joy and relief. She was right. They were coming. Cisco was coming. He was going home. And it all hit him so quickly and suddenly that he nearly dropped his pulse rifle. But instead he turned to look at her. To say something like thank you. Hell, just to say anything. But she wasn't there. She was gone. He let out a shuddered breath, falling to his knees as the emotions overwhelmed him. He let his gaze focus on the breach once more._ "One hundred and one days." _He sobbed out, but smiled wide when he saw Cisco step through with Barry right behind him._

 _Tess, the essence or whatever she was had been right._

_It was time to go home._

* * *

Zero Point dove for the breach. But what he got was cold, wet ground and a mouthful of dead leaves. The breach had closed just before he got to it. Mere seconds. "No..." he whispered, pushing up on all fours, looking around wildly as he panted cold breaths out in puffs of steam. "NOOOO!" He yelled, clawing at the leaves and dirt before getting up on his knees and grimacing, rage and hatred seething through his form. In the distance, the sun began to go down, the graying sky growing darker, the night's creatures beginning their cacophony. He'd been that close, so fucking close to getting home, to getting out of this hell hole, to getting his revenge. And Wells, The Flash... they took that from him. Again.

Slowly, he got to his feet, his makeshift spear in one hand as he lumbered away into the growing dark to find shelter. He could just lay down and die, let the creatures in this place take him out. But that would be losing. That would be giving up. And if he did that, then he'd never find a way off this Earth. He'd never get home. More importantly, he'd never get the chance to do to Wells what he'd been dreaming of doing for months. 

And that was just... not an option.

**Author's Note:**

> (To be continued...)


End file.
